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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

^^^Tf: — 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 




THE FOLLOWING LETTER 

FROM 

REVEREND S. F. SMITH, D.D., 

Author of " My Country, 't is of Thee" (America), was written to the author of 
" Uncle Sam's Church," on receiving a copy of the book. 

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/t^aZ^ ^a^lC/^ r/a^^^rt^-r- /- ^^r^..^ ^ •^'X^^l^X^ . 



** Uncle Sam's Church " was originally printed for private 
circulation. The warm approval which the book has received from 
the press y from eminent public men, distinguished divines ^ and presi- 
dents of patriotic societies throughout the country, has induced the 
author to place it in the hands of Lamson, Wolffe, ^ Co., 6 Beacon 
Street, Boston, for publication. The present edition appears on 
Washington'* s Birthday — an auspicious date. 



Uncle Sam's Church 

His Creed, Bible 
and Hymn-Book 



BY 

JOHN BELL BOUTON 

AUTHOR OF 

"ROUND THE BLOCK," "ROUNDABOUT TO MOSCOW,' 

"THE ENCHANTED," ETC. 



'-'Strike^ but Hear'' 





l^t^l-OM. 



BOSTON 

L^MSON, WOLFFE, AND COMPANY 

6, Beacon Street 

1895 



FIRST EDITION PRINTED JAN. 22, 1895. 
SECOND EDITION PRINTED FEB. 22, 1895. 



■Bf7f 



Copyright, 1895, 
By John Bell Bouton. 



Copyright, 1895, 
By Lamson, Wolffe, and Co. 



John Wilson and Son, Cambridge, U.S.A. 



PREFACE. 



THIS Republic is on the eve of stirring events. 
The New Patriotism that is in the air is 
but a Divine instinct of preparation for them. 

Our " White Navy " is something more than a 
harmless symbol of National power and pride. 
It is not a flock of doves. It means Peace 
only when that is consistent with Justice and 
Honor. 

It would be ignoble to avoid the path of our 
manifest destiny in the Western World. We 
shall soon be confronted with pressing questions 
of Annexation which cannot be shirked without 
discredit to our Mission. 

Socialists, with deceptive olive branches, and 
Anarchists, with real daggers, torches, and bombs, 
are menacing the institutions that are our heri- 
tage, bought by the Fathers with so great a price 
of blood and treasure. 



iv PREFACE. 

To meet the grave responsibilities and dangers 
that are ahead, the whole American people need 
a new baptism of Patriotism — by immersion. 
Their minds must be saturated with the thoughts 
and deeds of the immortal Founders of the 
Republic. They must learn by heart the vital 
phrases of the Declaration of Independence and 
of the Federal Constitution, which are the sacred 
charters of Liberty and Union. They must be 
brought to realize fully that these United States 
are in truth a Nation, and that the affection and 
allegiance of all its citizens are its first and right- 
ful due and the only sure pledge of their security 
and happiness. 

A National Patriotic Cult must be made to 
supply the place of an impossible State Religion. 

The object of this little book is to show how 

cheaply, easily, quickly, and surely this can be 

done in channels and by methods hitherto 

untried. 

J. B. B. 

Cambridge, Mass., 1895. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

The New Patriotism 7 

Signs of the Times 11 

Growth of Nationalism 13 

National Righteousness 19 

Uncle Sam's Creed 23 

Ark of Freedom's Covenant 25 

The Sacred Vouchers 29 

Uncle Sam's Bible 30 

A Washington Cult -33 

The Monroe Doctrine I'j 

Maps of the '* Promised Land " 42 

Uncle Sam's Hymn-Book 44 

Songs Truly National 47 

Counting the Cost 51 



Vi CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

Patriotism will find the Way 55 

Footing the Figures 59 

General Welfare 63 

Religion and Patriotism 65 

Education and Patriotism 68 

The Treason of Indifferentism 69 

A Grand Monopoly 70 

A New Rallying Call 73 



UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH, 



TO organize Patriotism ; to spread it over all 
the United States; to make it lasting: 
these are duties resting on every citizen, and 
the times are ripe for their performance. 

A revival of Patriotism is apparent in many 
ways and in many parts of the land. If it were a 
revival of religion, the churches most concerned 
in it would claim it as from God. And so it is. 
For Patriotism, like Religion and like human 
love, is an instinct divinely planted in the heart 
of Man. As Religion and Love are cultivated 
by expression and by practice, so is Patriotism. 

"Grieving away the Holy Spirit" has been 
declared by theologians to be the one unpar- 
donable sin. No language could be too lurid to 
portray its terrible consequences. On that point 
opinions have always honestly differed. But there 



8 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

can be no question about the penalty that may 
be incurred by neglecting the present golden 
opportunity to make Patriotism universal and 
fervid, North, South, East, and West. Miss this 
God-given opening of to-day, and the fortunate 
conjunction may never return. Then what may 
happen ? At some future time, not far off it may 
be, the lack of a profound, glowing Patriotism, 
coextensive with the entire Republic, — a Patri- 
otism in which all petty sectional interests and 
prejudices are fused and absorbed, — may per- 
mit the outbreak of serious local disaffections, 
revolts, formal secession even, only to be sup- 
pressed again by war with all its horrors. It 
would be but the proverbial repetition of history. 
God forbid ! But God in history is only the 
Divine Will working through Man. If we will 
not work with it, — if we do not now strive most 
earnestly to disseminate and exalt Patriotism as 
a virtue indispensable to national existence, — 
then it may be the melancholy task of some 
future annalist again to point the oft-told moral 
of Man's suicidal blindness in not seeing or not 
following out the plain signs of the times. 

Strike while the iron is hot. It glows on the 
anvil and waits for the hammer now. 



THE NEW PATRIOTISM. g 

To " get Religion." To " fall in Love." These 
familiar phrases imply the possibility of fixing 
precise dates at which the emotions were first 
felt. There is a new-born Patriotism in the air. 
But we cannot name its birthday. We only 
know that it is but a few years old. Don't mis- 
take it for a mere prolongation or echo of pre- 
vious patriotic outbursts. The Union uprising of 
'6 1 was the most intense manifestation of Patri- 
otism seen since 1776. It continued through the 
war and the Reconstruction period. Then came 
a reaction and a dreary void, when Patriotism was 
latent or languid. The hundredth anniversary 
of our national Independence roused it up again, 
and it culminated resplendently in the World's 
Fair at Philadelphia in 1876. The immediate 
origins of these two grand displays of Patriotism 
are obvious enough. But why, and w^ien, and 
where, the lull that followed the long round of 
Centennial rejoicings was first broken by the 
patriotic heart-throbs which we hear all about 
us to-day, no man knows. Different reasons sug- 
gested by human experience, some plausible, some 
nonsensical, all insufficient, may be assigned for 
this fresh access of a beautiful, divine sentiment. 
No party and no policy can justly claim the ex- 



lO UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

elusive glory of the rejzaissance. However much 
statesmen may have done to satisfy the patriotic 
instinct, the instinct was there before them quick 
to respond with enthusiasm. We may as well 
fall back on the good old word " Providential." 
It alone explains the inexplicable. 

Consider the glorious results of this new and 
strange outwelling of Patriotism. Here are some 
of them, all clearly traceable to the deep-lying 
fundamental cause. 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. 

The creation, out of next to nothing, of our 
"white Navy," which, ship for ship, has no supe- 
rior, if an equal, on the ocean. Not long ago the 
people were indifferent or hostile to large naval 
appropriations. Now they want them and woe 
be to the short-sighted law-makers who thwart 
their will ! 

The severe measures, some passed and others 
in preparation, for thrusting back anarchists, 
criminals, and dangerous classes generally, from 
our shores. Harsh precautions, but, unhappily, 
necessary for the well being of the Republic and 
its law-abiding, honest, industrious citizens. 



SIGNS OF THE TIMES. II 

The prompt and relentless crushing of mobs 
instigated by so-called Labor Unions and com- 
posed of strikers, ruffians, and thieves. The 
interference of Federal troops for this purpose, 
despite the protests of treacherous, impotent, and 
half-hearted Governors, was applauded by a nation 
of spectators — minus the demagogues and row- 
dies. If Uncle Sam's handful of boys had not 
sufficed for the job, he could have drawn at sight 
on the militia of all the other better governed 
communities to the last man, and his drafts 
would have been as swiftly honored in Louisiana 
as in Massachusetts. Not many years ago such 
vigorous, decisive action on the part of the Fed- 
eral Government would have been disapproved 
in many localities. It would have been fiercely 
condemned by political opponents. That it is 
heartily and quite unanimously commended now, 
is proof of the more pervasive, more ebullient 
patriotism of our day. 

The emphatic rebuke at the polls of the timid, 
distrustful, unprogressive, and un-American policy 
of the Administration in Samoa and the Hawa- 
iian Islands. If dilatory caution is a virtue in 
statesmanship, so is Patriotism. Perhaps excess 
of the one is only a deficiency of the other. The 



12 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

people, if we may judge them by their recent ver- 
dict, would have pardoned the President for a 
little haste and even precipitancy — for the good 
of his country and of Republican institutions — 
out in those isles of the Pacific. 

The solemn, overwhelming re-affirmation of 
Protection on the 5th of November last. Any- 
body can pick flaws in a Protective Tariff. There 
are as many defensible notions about the kinds 
and degrees of Protection among its supporters 
as there are sects of the Christian religion. But 
any sort of Protection, whatever its faults, has the 
nominal saving virtue of Americanism. It is an 
attempt to do something that is American for 
Americans, — something ostensibly patriotic, ben- 
eficial to the interests of the United States rather 
than those of foreign countries. It distinctly 
appeals to Patriotism for its support. And from 
the ballot-box a reflecting and convinced Patri- 
otism thunders " Yes." 

The breaking up of the solid Democratic 
South. This is the most important political 
event since the war. Tariff enticements had 
much to do with it. But these would have been 
powerless, had not thousands of Southerners felt 
patriotically disposed to level the old party bar- 



GROWTH OF NATIONALISM. 13 

rier and enjoy a freer air and larger life. The 
fiat has gone forth. The South is no longer the 
impregnable stronghold of one party, but a divided 
camp. And divided camps are what this country 
wants. The genius of our institutions requires 
the nearly even distribution of two great parties 
out of whose ceaseless attrition good comes by 
cautious experiments and slow degrees and occa- 
sional reversals of policy. The worst possible 
demarcation lines of such parties are geographi- 
cal. Sectionalism, with all its frightful dangers, 
is the sure result. A party monopoly of the 
South caused the Civil War. The best guaranty 
of a genuine and enduring Union is the replac- 
ing of Sectional by National ideas and issues all 
round. The nascent Republican party of the 
South may be trusted to do this. Then political 
cyclones will no longer originate in and about 
the Gulf States. 

The crushing defeat of the infamous Tammany 
gang in New York City. The new Patriotism — 
and nothing else — did it. It was not a question 
of keeping thieves' hands out of their pockets, 
for New Yorkers have been so long accustomed 
to feeling them there that they did not mind 
that. It was not a question of economy, for New 



14 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

Yorkers are nothing if not extravagant. It was 
a question of trying to save the name of their 
city from continuing to be the synonym of 
all that is dishonest and foul in Municipalism. 
That deplorable lack of public spirit, for which 
the citizens of New York, despite their religion, 
culture, and benevolence, have long been notori- 
ous, has at last given place to civic pride, — 
which is only another name of Patriotism. What 
Patriotism did for good government on the small 
field of New York City it can do everywhere and 
in every election, from that of the humblest 
official to that of the highest in the Republic. 
It is the panacea for the worst ills of the body 
politic. 

Even the oldest States, that have never lacked 
Patriotism, are now feeling new, delicious thrills 
of it in their unwithered veins. Massachusetts 
has flung aside her meaningless and wholesomely 
neglected Fast Day. She has substituted for its 
pretence of half rations and penitential gloom 
the joyous feast and laughing out-door life of 
Patriots' Day. It is Patriotism alone that dic- 
tated for the 19th of April, in every year, the 
grateful celebration of the momentous double 
event of Concord and Lexington. The term 



"PATRIOTS' DAY." 



15 



" Patriots' Day," applied to this ever glorious 
anniversary, was the happy thought of Governor 
Greenhalge. He did wisely in rejecting merely 
local or personal designations of the new festival. 
For he has hit upon a name, National in its sig- 
nificance and scope, well fitted for adoption by 
every State in the Union. Some time, let us 
hope, the meagre list of our National holidays 
will be enlarged by a " Patriots' Day," which will 
be celebrated with as much unanimity and enthu- 
siasm as the Fourth of July. 

The recent formation of strong societies com- 
posed of lineal descendants of worthies of the 
Colonial and Revolutionary periods. The best 
known among these organizations are the " Colo- 
nial Dames " and the " Society of Colonial Wars," 
the "Sons" and "Daughters " of the "American 
Revolution," and the " Sons " and " Daughters" of 
the " Revolution." The Colonial Dames have chap- 
ters in the thirteen original States and the District of 
Columbia only. The " Sons" and the " Daughters" 
can incorporate themselves for the affiliated work 
in whatever State or Territory they live. These are 
spontaneous and sincere outgrowths of the New 
Patriotism, and seem to be deservedly flourishing. 
Their declared objects and aims are most excel- 



l6 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

lent, and they ought to have an assured future of 
great usefulness in feeding and trimming the lamp 
of Patriotism so that the holy light shall never go 
out upon the altar. We must not smile at pride 
of ancestry when the ancestors were patriots. If 
there is any "blue blood" in the United States, 
it is the kind that flowed at Bunker Hill, Ben- 
nington, Saratoga, Princeton, Monmouth, King's 
Mountain, Camden, and Eutaw. There should 
be noted also the increased interest and enthusi- 
asm shown about the camp-fires of the " Grand 
Army of the Republic " from year to year. And 
the "Sons of the Veterans" are coming on the 
stage with youthful vigor and martial tread to 
take the place of their sires, as guardians of the 
sacred traditions, when they are all dead and 
the pension rolls shelved as precious relics of 
the past. 

Other good things have been brought forth in 
this new birth. They are cumulative evidence on 
a point already proved, and need only be sum- 
marized : — 

The enormously increased demand for Histo- 
ries of the United States and of the Civil War, 
especially in a popular and abridged form for the 
young. 



"OLD GLORY." 1 7 

The multiplication of short biographies of the 
statesmen and warriors of the troublous times. 

The study of the Constitution and the work- 
ings of Republican Government in the Public 
Schools. 

The greater respect paid to " Old Glory " as 
the stainless emblem of National renown and the 
symbol and pledge of Union, no matter how many 
new stars emblazon its celestial blue. This ap- 
pears in the increased frequency of its display on 
State Houses, City Halls, Public Schools, and 
private buildings, Liberty poles, and wh.erever else 
the breezes of Heaven can caress it. 

The World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago. 
Though this stupendous fair celebrated no event 
in the history of the Republic, it was none the 
less a brilliant triumph of National Patriotism. 
Marvellous as a display of the whole world's 
treasures of Nature, Science, and Art, its grand- 
est claim on our admiration was its gathering of 
representative citizens and tributes from every 
part of the Union. If any sectional jealousy was 
at first excited by the choice of the great city of 
the West as the site of the Exposition, this was 
soon merged in the noble sentiment of a Unity 
which takes the same pride in Chicago as in New 



l8 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

York. If the centre of gravity has been shifted 
by the westward march of Empire, we yet remain, 
all alike, sharers in the increasing glory of the 
Republic, one and indivisible. 



UNCLE SAMS CHURCH. 

Here, then, is a vast field already well prepared 
for the systematic, searching, wholly beneficent 
work of what may be called, without irreverence, 
" Uncle Sam's Church." It is a Church that has 
its long roll of saints and martyrs, nobler than 
many that have been canonized and whose bones 
are objects of reverence. Like other churches, 
it has its Creed, its Bible, and its Hymn-Book, but 
it has no hierarchy or priesthood. Of course it 
is not a church in any dictionary sense of the 
word, as that implies a religion to go with the 
Church ; and Uncle Sam is debarred by the Con- 
stitution from setting up " an Establishment of 
Religion." There are sects of Christianity that 
would be only too happy to conceal his bright 
fantastic garb under a sombre and decorous re- 
ligious habit — always provided it were cut from 
their cloth and in their fashion. Our friends of 
the Roman Catholic, the Episcopalian, the Meth- 



NATIONAL RIGHTEOUSNESS. 19 

odist, the Presbyterian, the Baptist, and perhaps 
other connections, would gladfy secure his cus- 
tom for their exclusive tailoring. But, as his 
patronage is wholly out of the question, none of 
them are touting for it. If any one of them 
lifted a voice or a finger with that intent, the 
ambitious sect would bring upon itself an over- 
whelming torrent of indignant scorn and denun- 
ciation from all the others, as a pistol shot starts 
an avalanche. The country would be too hot to 
hold any sect or set of men who should plot for 
the repeal of this most just, equitable, and wise 
Constitutional prohibition. Unless the Ameri- 
cans of the future change for the incredibly worse, 
and become by a vast majority the slaves and tools 
of priestcraft, there is no probability that such a 
thing will be ever attempted. 

Being forever estopped by his experienced and 
long-headed sponsors from making hazardous ven- 
tures under the name of " Religion," (as defined 
in all the lexicons and universally understood of 
men,) Uncle Sam is perfectly free to put his sound 
mind and his good heart into the culture and dif- 
fusion of Patriotism. This, properly aided and 
developed under his fostering care, may be made 
a practical National Righteousness — in the root 



20 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

sense of right and wise conduct. What greater 
good than that would any religious sect be likely 
to do for the country if it had full swing? It 
might do much less. It might develop into a 
spiritual tyranny, — the most cruel and hateful of 
all. Once repeal the prohibition of a religious 
establishment and install some sect at Washing- 
ton, and the next step would be straight along 
the line of the amendment text (Article I.) to 
erase the clause that now protects the " free ex- 
ercise " of religion by all ; and, as inevitable 
corollaries, would swiftly follow the abridgment 
of freedom of speech and of the press. 

These priceless blessings, among the most 
cherished in our national bill of rights, would 
perish with the blow that cut the tap-root of our 
free reliQ:ious life. The " reliofious test " now for- 
bidden in Article VII. would be interpolated 
there and imposed, and then we should realize 
what we now only read of and shudder over in 
books, the ferocious zeal of fanatics and bigots 
when unchecked by the civil arm. History has 
never failed to repeat itself whenever the Church 
has mastered the State. And Churches seek no 
alliance with States where such supremacy is 
not sought after with every wile, and most 



HAPPILY SECULARIZED SOIL. 2I 

patiently. Guard well the first line of defences 
in the Constitution, and that danger will not be 
incurred on this happily secularized soil. 



HOW TO DO IT. 

Now, how can Uncle Sam best promote this 
inspiring patriotic cult, which must stand for the 
Nation in lieu of an impossible State religion.? 
The plan which I have the honor to propose to 
the American people is so simple, eas)^ and 
cheap, that it may seem at first absurdly dis- 
proportionate to the great objects sought to be 
attained. But before enlarging upon this branch 
of the subject, let us look a little at the immense 
vantage ground already exclusively occupied by 
Uncle Sam, affording him almost innumerable 
temples or radiating centres for immediate use. 
It is all very well to talk of a " Church invisible." 
But most people want their churches very visible 
indeed, with walls, towers, spires, and all the pal- 
pable signs of wealth and social influence for 
which sects so earnestly contend. The first and 
best ornament of the infant village of America is 
the church edifice, in whose erection some con- 
fraternity of worshippers often goes far beyond its 



22 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

cash resources and borrows largely. Hundreds 
of millions of dollars are invested — and well in- 
vested — throughout the United States in these 
houses of God. The enormous cost of their con- 
struction has always been deemed necessary by 
rival denominations for the furtherance, if not the 
very existence, of their respective beliefs. 

If this is true but in part, then Uncle Sam has 
good reason to congratulate himself as the pos- 
sessor of nearly sixty-nine thousand visible 
churches, all his own and all paid for except a 
few which he hires temporarily but equally under 
his control, in every city, town, and village of the 
United States. These buildings are some large, 
imposing, and costly, others less ambitious in 
design and decoration, but still handsome, and 
others of a humbler order and a plainer finish. 
The towering marble or granite or iron piles, 
sometimes filling entire squares, are for the great 
cities of the land. They may be called the 
Cathedrals. The second-rate cities and consider- 
able towns are provided with structures larger 
perhaps than their immediate requirements, but 
generously planned with a view to future needs. 
The lesser, down to the least, nuclei of popula- 
tion are never nesflected in this distribution. 



THE PATRIOTIC CULT. 23 

They all have a building, large or small, which 
they owe to Uncle Sam. I am alluding to the 
Post Offices of the United States, and I 
propose that every one of them be tised, with the 
least delay practicable, as an active centre for the 
exposition and propagation of the Patriotic Cult. 

UNCLE SAm's creed. 

How can this best be done } Answer : By 
the free, but judicious, use of Uncle Sam s print- 
ing press. It could be run, at odd hours, on such 
plain work as placards and tracts or pamphlets, 
which should consist of Patriotism boiled down 
to its quintessence. Take the placards, first in 
order if not first in importance. Two of them 
would be required to be hung on the walls of 
each of the 69,000 post offices. One should be 
the " Declaration of Independence," the other 
the " Constitution of the United States," each 
entire and without note or comment. The pla- 
cards should be printed in bold, easily legible 
type, on strong cloth-backed paper for perma- 
nence, and of a size and style to challenge the 
attention of the least observant man. These 
two documents contain Uncle Sam's Articles of 



24 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

Faith. Read them together, and you have his 
Creed. Creeds have always been expensive, cost- 
ing, before they have earned the right to live, 
immense sacrifices of blood and treasure. Those 
splendid gems of truth, which the immortal sign- 
ers of the Declaration called self-evident, (but 
none the less denied by tyrants, the world over,) 
cost the infant Colonies the Revolutionary war. 
It was a great price, but the peerless jevv^els were 
worth it. A single Article of Faith — No. XIII. 
of the Constitutional Amendments • — came as 
high as hundreds of thousands of lives and thou- 
sands of millions of dollars. It was the abolition 
of slavery. Every word of the Declaration, from 
the stately " When in the course of human 
events " down to the sublime pathetic close, " we 
mutually pledge to each other our lives, our 
fortunes, and our sacred honor," is fraught with 
the weiofhtiest meanino: to Americans for all 
time. The awful indictment against poor old 
George III. is not merely a curious piece of 
ancient history. It particularizes the exact kind 
of oppressions which tyrants always practise in 
their refusal of man's " unalienable rights " to 
"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." 
" Eternal vigilance is the price of Liberty," with- 



ARK OF P'REEDOM'S COVENANT. 25 

out which its immense cost is but an aimless 
waste. Therefore, it behooves all Americans to 
keep ever before their eyes the Declaration of 
Independence as a powerful incentive to watch- 
fulness as^ainst foes within and foes without. 
The Constitution is to the Declaration what res- 
olutions should be to a preamble, — the logical 
sequel. The one is the fulfilment pf the other's 
pledges. Together, they are the ark of Free- 
dom's covenant, — enshrining all that is best of 
human experience in the science and art of self- 
government in all the Ages. As the creed of 
Uncle Sam's Church, they have the unique advan- 
tage among creeds of extreme simplicity, so that 
everybody can understand it, and also of com- 
manding full belief without any mental reserva- 
tion whatever. 

In this country everybody goes to the Post 
Office. Houses of worship are open only on 
Sundays, but the Post Office is open every day. 
It is the most public of all public places. It is 
to Americans what the Forum was to the Romans, 
and what the market-place still is to many towns 
in the Old World. Hang these placards on the 
walls of Post Office lobbies all over the country, 
with or without the richly gilded frames they 



26 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

deserve, and they would be read — and read 
often, I believe — by every man, woman, and 
child who could read English. Curiosity is 
catching and the illiterate may be trusted to 
find somebody to interpret to them the mystic 
signs on the walls which everybody else is 
scanning. 

For the placard, be it understood, is the best 
thing yet devised — always excepting the news- 
paper — to plant the blow of an idea between the 
eyes of mankind. The town-crier — save in a few 
backwood retreats — is obsolete, and when he 
went his rounds his voice was apt to be thick 
with fog or something, or hoarse from much 
shouting, and his mumbled and broken sentences 
were not easily caught except by the small circle 
wuthin swing of his bell. The placard is uni- 
versally read because it is a placard. No matter 
whether it announces a coming circus, an auc- 
tion sale, an article lost, a list of citizens registered 
and entitled to vote, a patent medicine, or what 
not, it is equally a centre of staring interest. 
The artful advertisements that confront the uni- 
versal eye in railway stations, and in electric, 
cable, and horse cars, on the roofs of houses, 
board fences, dead walls, and elsewhere, are po- 



THE POWERFUL PLACARD. 27 

tent charmers of money out of closely buttoned 
pouches. If venders of nostrums can get rich by 
playing upon this inveterate human weakness, 
Uncle Sam may surely depend on the same 
means of advertising Patriotism. 

Placards have always been powerful allies of 
Revolution. Empires and kingdoms have been 
overturned by them. Our Patriot fathers used 
them adroitly in the darkest hours of the sacred 
cause, and they never failed to irradiate the gloom. 
They cheered the discouraged and spurred the 
sluggish as liothing else could. The apparition 
of placards on the curbstones has struck terror 
to the hearts of emperors and kings. No mon- 
arch is so firmly seated on his throne that he does 
not quake a little before the mysterious threat 
that comes out of the darkness. If the placard 
is one of the most effective means of inciting 
men to rise against bad forms of government, 
why may It not be utilized to brace up the best 
government on the face of the earth ? Space 
then for the placards, in dimensions ample, in 
type big enough to be read five or ten feet away, 
hung (but not too high) on the inside walls of 
every one of Uncle Sam's churches, whether it 
be a " Cathedral " in New York, Chicago, or Bos- 



28 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

ton, or the hired half of a log shanty in the wilds 
of Oregon ! 

At this juncture the Critic, bursting with im- 
patience and imagined wisdom, interposes : — 
" My dear sir, this is all rubbish. You are be- 
hind the age. Every schoolboy knows the Con- 
stitution by heart. It is now taught in the com- 
mon schools. As for the Declaration, it is read 
every Fourth of July at public meetings; and 
citizens who want to hear it can do so simply by 
attending. Those who don't want to hear it stay 
away, — and they are in the large majority. No 
wonder, for the reading of it entire by the village 
elocutionist is generally considered a bore." 

Reply : It is true that some of the schoolboys 
of our day, in Massachusetts and a few other 
States, are privileged to read the Constitution in 
admirable text-books descriptive of the upbuild- 
inor of American institutions. It is also com- 
prised in the courses, obligatory or optional, of 
many colleges and universities. The Constitu- 
tion (and perhaps the Declaration) has recently 
been published in a cheap pam.phlet form under 
the auspices of certain patriotic societies. But 
it does not seem to have attained very general 
circulation among the people. At the two largest 



THE SACRED VOUCHERS. 29 

bookstores in Cambridge, Mass., I was told that 
" there was nothing of the kind in stock." I 
found my copy of the Constitution, brought down 
to date for reference, only in an Englishman's 
book — strangely enough ! — in the Appendix of 
Volume I. of Bryce's " American Commonwealth." 
For the Declaration of Independence I was 
driven to Volume V. of Bancroft's History of the 
United States. These charters of our liberties 
may be hidden away in still other books " which 
no gentleman's library should be without." But 
that does not affect my contention in the least. 
There are doubtless a great many Americans of 
the educated class who know something (call it 
a good deal, if you please) of the text of the Con- 
stitution and the initial Declaration. The risinsf 
generation in a few of the States may be im- 
pelled to make some acquaintance with them, — 
too often perhaps as a task. But I maintain 
that, to a vast majority of Americans, old, middle- 
aged, and young, these sacred vouchers of Lib- 
erty and Union are unknown save by casual and 
infrequent citation and reference, too often even 
then with the gloss and twist put upon them by 
demagogues or fine-spun theorists. We want them 
without note or comment, as we want the Holy 



30 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

Bible. We want them supplied by Uncle Sam 
to all the people without money and without 
price. We want them as free as the air, and as 
universal. We want them not merely tendered 
to all ignorant or partially informed persons, but 
obtruded upon them and hammered into them, 
day after day, by the everlasting placards. Up 
then with Uncle Sam's Creed in Uncle Sam's 
Church ! And be quick about it ! Delays are 
dangerous, and wide-spread ignorance of the ori- 
gin, foundation, and nature of our government is 
a standing menace to its stability.-^ 

UNCLE SAm's bible. 

Now for the tracts, or pamphlets, or booklets, 
or leaflets. No matter about the name so long 
as the thing itself is not bulky or tedious. This 
mode of inculcating Patriotism has its peculiar, 
inestimable advantages. The tract is to the big 
book what the Maxim gun is to the heavy 
artillery. It makes vastly less noise in the firing, 
and does a hundred times the execution. The 
small arms may win victories while the big guns 
are unlimberino:. Tracts have made crises and 
have always accompanied them since printing 

1 The Declaration and Constitution could also be published in tract 
form for general distribution. 



UNCLE SAM'S BIBLE. 3I 

was invented. Like the placard, they are fore- 
runners of revolution, and do not stay their 
course till the goal is reached. " These are the 
times that try men's souls," were the opening 
words of Paine's stirring tract, " Common Sense," 
which blew the smouldering fire of patriotic dis- 
content into a blaze in 1776. The most tremen- 
dous religious upheaval in England since the 
Reformation — itself greatly furthered by pam- 
phleteering — resulted from the " Tractarian 
movement." The Oxford tracts made a rent as 
of a spiritual earthquake in the Church of Eng- 
land, the effect of which is visible to this day. 
Religious Tract Societies have flourished in the 
United States for nearly a century. There is the 
famous American Tract Society, and there are 
separate Tract Societies for every denomination, 
and they all testify to the incalculable good that 
tracts can do in reaching the homes and hearts 
of the people. From this universal experience 
Uncle Sam may safely draw the conclusion : 
If tracts are one of the main stays of churches in 
general, they are just the thing for his Church. 
If tracts awakened Patriotism in 1776, tracts 
can keep Patriotism from going to sleep in 
1895. 



32 



UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 



The material available in Uncle Sam's archives 
for the preparation of these tracts is inexhaustible. 
It all turns on judicious selection and editing. 
The sole object should be to increase everywhere 
a love of Republican institutions and of the 
Union. The line to be pursued is the lijie of 
least resistance. Uncle Sam's Church is not 
sectional or partisan, but national and patriotic, 
not confined to Massachusetts, New York, Penn- 
sylvania, and Ohio, but casting its protecting 
shade over the entire United States. The tracts 
would not only fail in their mission, but would do 
a real mischief, if they were given over to the glo- 
rification of one State or one section above an- 
other State or another section, or to the teasing 
and taunting: revival of the memories of extinct 
issues. The tracts should emphasize, not the past 
or present differences between States and sec- 
tions, but their agreements. They should always 
be designed to promote harmony by ignoring dis- 
cords. Every good American has the same her- 
itage in the great thoughts and great acts of his 
great forefathers. There and there only in the 
past is the ground common to all. 



A WASHINGTON CULT. 33 

With these rules as a guide there should 
be little difficulty in determining what tracts to 
issue, and even to fix proximately their order of 
appearance. The list subjoined is respectfully 
suggested as a partial one, in the nature of samples 
only. Short as it is, years would be required to 
distribute its components effectively (with other 
tracts of a different character, of hardly less 
moment, to be hereinafter mentioned) among 
sixty-five million people. It will be observed that 
the subjects are, in every case, persons or events 
of a remote and universally honored past, upon 
which, so far as we now know, the final verdict of 
history has been rendered, and recalling only 
memories in which every American may now feel 
the same interest and take the same pride. 

I. A Sketch Life of George Washington. — 
Biographies of Washington, like the Declaration 
and the Constitution, are now sealed books to 
millions of Americans. Those that are sold over 
counters or used in public schools reach only the 
small minority. The whole country needs to be 
taught the great lesson of Washington's life. 
Those who have learned it once will profit by 
studying it again. We want a Washington cult 
that will throw about a Republic the same kind 



34 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

of charm with which the Napoleonic cult has al- 
ways invested Imperialism. Thousands of Amer- 
icans are now harking back to the Napoleonic 
era to slake their thirst for exciting biography. 
Washington's career, though less romantic and 
picturesque than the great Corsican's, is still very 
impressive, apart from the noble moral it conveys. 
If Napoleon is now kindling anew the admiration 
and sympathy of large numbers of our country- 
men in the revamped versions of the oft-told 
tale, it is time to repeat the less thrilling but 
highly interesting story of the august Father of 
his Country. If the serial issue of the books of 
Uncle Sam's Bible stopped with the first number, 
the good done would still pay well for the experi- 
ment. It is in Washington's matchless character 
that American patriotism will always find its 
brightest example. Twelve pages would suffice 
to impart a good general idea of Washington's 
life and work. While it would probably fur- 
nish to the immense majority of Americans the 
amplest memoir of the man they will ever have, 
it would serve only as a keen appetizer for multi- 
tudes, and set them to buying and reading com- 
pleter books on the same subject. In truth, this 
will be the certain effect of all the tracts that may 



WASHINGTON'S FAREWELL ADDRESS. 35 

follow, and thus private enterprise will become an 
assistant in Uncle Sam's work. 

2. Washington s Farewell Address. — This is 
the political last will and testament of the greatest 
and best American. It is laden with the rich 
fruitage of his long observation and experience 
of men and of institutions. In its knowledge of 
human nature it is profound, and eternally true. 
In its prescience and its solemn monitions it has 
the inspiration of prophecy. Its grand thoughts 
are marshalled with soldierly exactness, and march 
straight to just conclusions. Its sonorous Latin- 
English, in the use of which Washington ex- 
celled, provides a kind of music for the stately 
tread of the argument. It concerns "the People 
of the United States " to-day, and will do so for 
unborn generations, as much as it did when its 
author sent it forth. It is to the Republic what 
the Sermon on the Mount is to Christendom. 
The Republic will be safe and the Union indis- 
soluble as long as Washington's Farewell Address 
is universally read and heeded. It must be taken 
out of the seclusion of such books as Sparks's 
*' Life and Writings of Washington," in the 
twelfth volume of which I found it, and bestowed 
upon the public in an eight-page form. 



36 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

3. A Sketch Life of yohn Adams, — A typi- 
cal American in the qualities which have most 
powerfully contributed to the welfare and glory 
of the Republic. A worthy successor of Wash- 
ington as President, than which no higher tribute 
of praise could be paid. 

4. A Sketch Life of Thomas Jefferson. — How 
fortunate for the young nation that it had such a 
sage and patriot as Jefferson in reserve to follow 
Washington and Adams ! The author of the 
Declaration of Independence can never be too 
highly honored, nor his example too closely 
copied, by those who are privileged to enjoy the 
blessings conferred upon his fellow countrymen 
and their successors, and upon all mankind, by 
his clear head and his great heart. 

5. A Sketch Life of James Madison. — The 
special title of the fourth President of the United 
States to the grateful esteem of all Americans 
is his patriotic attitude in sternly resisting the 
audacious British claim of the right to seize and 
impress sailors on board American ships. Nomi- 
nally limited to British subjects only, the outrage 
was often committed on American-born citizens 
also. The only excuse was England's desperate 
anxiety to recruit her navy during her exhaust- 



THE MONROE DOCTRINE. 



n 



ing war with France. Madison's firmness cost 
the country the war of 1812. But the price was 
cheap for the ends secured. 

6. A Sketch Life of James Monroe, — Eternal 
honor and gratitude are due to the promulgator 
of the " Monroe doctrine." From the Presiden- 
tial chair, in 1823, Monroe uttered the emphatic 
warning to all European powers to meddle no 
more with political affairs on this continent. 
The third Napoleon's disregard of this traditional 
doctrine, at a time when he fondly thought the 
Union was in the throes of dissolution, led to his 
infamous attempt to found a branch empire in 
Mexico, followed by the recall of his troops after 
the downfall of the Rebellion and the recoil 
upon himself of his miserable failure, soon to be 
succeeded by the deserved collapse of his hollow 
sham of Imperialism in France. Monroe's life 
should give the inspiring causes of the great 
doctrine that bears his name, with extracts from 
one of Henry Clay's magnificent speeches in its 
support. It may come up again some day for re- 
application. It is a meat upon which Patriotism 
may feed endlessly. 



38 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

Enough of these specimens of biography in 
little. Turn now to the historiettes of the great 
epochs of our common past, — remembering 
again that the object is to promote Patriotism by 
avoiding differences and painful recollections, sec- 
tional and political, and emphasizing agreements 
as far as possible. What are the periods of 
bygone times best calculated, in these condensed 
recitals, to stimulate the pride and enthusiasm 
of Americans irrespective of locality and of 
party? Among them certainly are the Revo- 
lutionary War, the War of 1812, and the War 
with Mexico. It is only in the foreign wars of 
the Republic that we should seek for the strong 
tonic of Nationality. The Colonial times prior 
to the Revolution also afford excellent material 
of this kind. When Patrick Henry in 1774 pas- 
sionately declared, " I am not a Virginian, / am 
an American',' he voiced an idea which, if uni- 
versally believed in and acted upon now, would 
realize our highest aspirations of National Unity. 

Pausing here, in the attempt to specify a few 
examples out of the rich mass of historical mate- 
rials at hand, let us pass to another fountain head 
of enlightenment for the whole American people. 
It is the Eleventh Census. 



THE CENSUS LESSONS. 



39 



The Census is the most thorough and in all 
respects the fairest survey obtainable of the Union 
in all its parts, and of all its multiform products, 
and industries, and opportunities. The integrity 
of its intention and the comparative accuracy of 
its figures none can dispute. Every American 
ought to know what the ponderous tomes of the 
Census Report have to say, not merely about his 
own State and section, but about every nook and 
corner of the country. It is such knowledge that 
breaks down petty local barriers, and makes 
every reflecting citizen who possesses it " an 
American." He is thus brought to look upon 
the United States in the true light, as a Nation. 
Toward this Nation of his he should come to 
feel the same pride and attachment that English- 
men feel for England, Germans for Germany, 
Frenchmen for France, Russians for Russia, Ital- 
ians for Italy, and Japanese for Japan, regardless 
of interior territorial bounds. Our census returns 
widen the horizon and enlarge the outlook for 
every man who reads them aright. But no one 
ever sees them now save on the shelves of public 
libraries, and not always there. The vital lessons 
of these inaccessible volumes should be com- 
pressed into handy pamphlets and put into every 



40 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

American home. Contrast the latest statistics 
with those of the Census of 1800, for example, 
and they will show at a single glance what Lib- 
erty and Union have done and can do ! 

If a series of tracts of the varieties I have 
described, carefully and wisely prepared, were ulti- 
mately bound up in book form, they would be sur- 
passed in their wealth of instructiveness for the 
good of mankind by only one volume in the world, 
the Holy Scriptures. They would contain the 
ripe and perfect flowering of political truth, which 
has fallen to the lot of America as heir of all the 
ages. They would afford the surest and best 
guidance to the Art of Government by the Peo- 
ple, for the People, upon the theory and practice 
of which depend the freedom, the progress, and 
the happiness of the human race. In the pages 
of such a book would be found maxims of con- 
summate wisdom and goodness which are not less 
divine because they do not claim direct revela- 
tion. There would be prophecy and fulfilment. 
There would be appeals of incomparable power 
and beauty in behalf of justice, right, the liberty 
of the individual, on the one hand, and, on the 
other hand, the duty of self-sacrifice for the good 
of all. There would be history teaching the 



UNCLE SAM'S BIBLE. 4I 

soundest lessons by example. There would be 
biography holding up the loftiest standards of 
patriotism and courage and rectitude for univer- 
sal imitation. There would be unimpeachable 
facts and figures in abundance to prove what the 
Republican system of government has done for 
the advancement, the security, and the felicity of 
man in the Western World. Surely it is not too 
much to call such a book Uncle Sam's Bible. 

The word " Bible " is, of course, here employed 
in its original and exact sense of " Book." Thus, 
the " Holy Bible " is often termed the " Good 
Book," or the " Book of Books." 

Though Uncle Sam is shut out from any reli- 
gious propaganda, the circulation of these docu- 
ments must, nevertheless, serve to widen and 
deepen, among all thoughtful readers, a convic- 
tion of the immanence of God in History. In no 
country and in no age is His guidance more 
clearly shown than in this Republic, from its be- 
ginning down to the present day. Uncle Sam's 
Bible will, therefore, tend to increase a belief in 
and a reverence for the Supreme Ruler, form- 
ing a basis upon which Religion may build 
securely. 



42 . UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

MAPS OF THE " PROMISED LAND." 

Uncle Sam's Bible should be illustrated. Por- 
traits and other pictures, if well done, would 
greatly illuminate its pages. The nature and 
extent of these illustrations need not be indicated 
here. If the importance of such pictorial aids is 
challenged by anybody, the value of a good Map 
of the United States will pass unquestioned. If 
children in any of the public schools get their 
map of the United States by heart, as they 
rarely do, they are apt to forget it when they 
grow up. Probably not one adult American out 
of every one thousand could to-day pass an 
examination on the boundaries of all the States 
of the Union, their capitals and largest towns, 
the trend of the chief mountain ranges, the posi- 
tion of the great lakes, and the course of the 
principal rivers. Good maps of this country are 
not cheap. Their price puts them beyond the 
reach of millions of people. Most of the best 
maps offered for sale, or shown in public places, 
are mere railway advertisements. They are 
streaked with broad black or red or blue lines, 
to mark particular railway systems. Rival routes 
are wholly omitted, or are faintly outlined. Cities, 



MAPS OF THE "PROMISED LAND." 43 

towns, mountains, rivers, and all else that goes 
to the making of a faithful map, are slighted or 
ruthlessly left out, unless they have some rela- 
tion to the " system." The shape of the con- 
tinent and the contour of vStates are too often 
grotesquely distorted by foreshortening and other 
tricks in order to make lines seem shorter and 
straighter than they really are. There is a press- 
ing need for a new, trustworthy official map, 
drawn to scale from the latest government sur- 
veys, in which all the great railways shall be im- 
partially treated, and equal and due prominence 
be given to the natural topographical features and 
to the chief towns in every part of the Union. 
It should be large enough to afford a fair show 
even to tiny Rhode Island, which is huddled out 
of sight in the contracted maps most in vogue. 
It should be printed on strong paper, in legible 
lines and letters, and should be given away to 
every adult applicant from every post office in 
the country. Not till Uncle Sam undertakes 
this great and good work will the vast majority 
of American citizens ever know what these 
United States really are. When they have mas- 
tered this sadly neglected knowledge by the aid 
of proper maps, they will realize for the first 



44 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

time what enormous extents of territory, and 
what diversities of latitude, of cHmate, and of 
interests, from Arctic Alaska to Tropical Florida, 
are bound up together in the Union. 

To study the interests of other people is the 
surest way to take a man out of himself, that is, 
to make him less selfish. To study the interests 
of other sections of country is the surest way 
to take a man out of his own section, in other 
words, to make him less sectional. Upon the 
mutual knowledge between the States of one 
another's interests and wants, and the large and 
warm sympathies resulting therefrom, depend 
the existence of the Union and the good of all. 
This is Patriotism as Uncle Sam's Map of the 
New Canaan, or Promised Land, would teach it. 



UNCLE SAMS HYMN-BOOK. 

Uncle Sam has some hymns all ready to go 
along with his Bible and his Creed. There is no 
embarrassment of choice here. The National 
Songs that can be relied on to stir an American's 
blood to the point of fighting and dying for his 
country if need be — and that is the best test of 
their value — maybe counted on less than ten 



UNCLE SAM'S HYMN-BOOK. 45 

fingers. Songs that are spontaneously adopted 
by the People, and sung with equal fervor in the 
richest mansions and the poorest hovels, in the 
camp, in the trenches, and on the eve of battle, 
are the rarest of products. They are the one 
man's lyrical expression of the inarticulate cries 
of a million men. The poet is the ordained 
voice of ajl that dumbness. When he is in love, 
he writes love songs for the world of lovers to 
sing. When he is in a religious ecstasy, he writes 
the hymns that are sung with passionate vehe- 
mence in all the churches of Christendom. 
When patriotic frenzy seizes him, he writes the 
song of a Nation. There must be the great 
occasion, the true poet, and the melting heat, 
before the National Hymn can be. One such 
hymn may be made equal to a hundred crises, 
and may outlast the life of a Nation. The 
People cling to a few such songs when tried 
and proved, and do not crave new ones. The 
old ones, like all the songs the common people 
have ever loved, have the gift of immortal youth. 

If a jury of twelve well informed patriotic 
Americans should try the claims of all competing 
songs for the great honor of inclusion among 
the first seven in Uncle Sam's Hymn-Book, they 



46 



UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 



would probably render their verdict without 
leaving the box. They would find for Smith's 
" America," Key's " Star Spangled Banner," Hop- 
kinson's "Hail Columbia," Shaw's "Columbia, the 
Gem of the Ocean," Morris's " Flag of the Union," 
and Dwight's " Our Country " and Pierpont's 
" Our Fathers " (both deeply religious and sung 
to the same convenient tune as " America "), per- 
haps nearly in the order here given. If Drake's 
grand " American Flag," had been cast in a met- 
rical form suitable for popular musical setting, it 
might be to-day one of our best National Hymns, 
and easily take its place as third on the list, if not 
higher up. Like some other superb lyrics of 
Liberty and Union, its words must remain its 
own and only music. When the question arises 
of selecting the next seven, or even one or two, 
worthy, with their music, of Uncle Sam's Hymn- 
Book, the trouble begins. But it is much les- 
sened by an exacting observance of the only rule 
that should govern the selections. They must 
be national, not sectional, good for all time, in 
peace as in war, not temporary and fitted only 
to special crises that have been outlived. Uncle 
Sam's Hymn-Book must be adapted to circu- 
late not only in New England and the Northern 



SONGS TRULY NATIONAL. 



47 



States, but all through that great cluster of com- 
monwealths now fast returning to the fold of 
a sincere, hearty, union-loving sisterhood. Sec- 
tionalism and sectional issues should not be 
sung, as they should not be preached, any 
longer. This sensible ruling throws out of 
court most of the Battle Hymns, some of high 
merit, written during the Civil War for the ex- 
press purpose of firing the hearts of armies in 
the field. 

It is not always, or usually, the greatest poets 
who write the songs that become " National." 
Sometimes the writers are deficient in Patriotism, 
looking upon it as a tawdry sentiment unworthy 
of their muse. Sometimes their sympathies are, 
by stress of circumstance, tied down to localities, 
and they give to a province what was meant 
for a Nation. Often, they become allied with a 
great party movement or a burning question of 
social reform or philanthropy, and, as its ap- 
pointed bards, have no time or inclination to 
chant anything else. In the United States the 
poets of the first rank have, like too many of 
their compatriots, travelled far more in Europe 
than at home. They have not realized, by seeing, 
the greatness of their heritage, or been made to 



48 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

feel the essential oneness of the Union and the 
kinship of all its inhabitants despite the differ- 
ences of climate and conditions. What splendid 
National Songs, of the real lasting quality, might 
have been written thirty odd years ago, if we 
had been engaged in a foreign war, instead of a 
fratricidal conflict ! For one reason or another, 
the twelve good men and true who have been 
set to choosing the contents of Uncle Sam's 
Hymn-Book would not find much suitable mat- 
ter in the works of some of the poets we most 
love and honor. The people have been there 
before the jury, and, if they have discovered 
nothing serviceable for a national song, perhaps 
it is too late now to find one. But let us be 
hopeful, and see what may be done. 

There is Bryant with two spirited lyrics, 
National all over, — " The Battle JField," and " O 
Mother of a Mighty Race." Holmes put the 
right stuff into his " Old Ironsides," and, if that 
has not been wedded to music, the espousal 
should be no longer delayed. Longfellow, prodi- 
gal in so much else, gave to his admiring coun- 
try but a poor dole of undiluted Patriotism; 
and the hand that wrote " Paul Revere 's Ride " 
and those sublime too brief lines, " Thou, too, 



LONGFELLOW, LOWELL, AND WHITTIER. 49 

sail on, O Ship of State," could have struck 
every chord in the National lyre ! Lowell, too, 
who could have done so much, did little that 
would truly fit into Uncle Sam's Hymn-Book. 
His three Memorial Odes — " The Washington 
Elm," the " Concord Bridge," and " The Harvard 
Commemoration" — are lambent in passages with 
the purest and loftiest patriotism. If the meter 
were not irregular — of a sort that might be 
called broken-candy, in its lines of unequal 
length and all sweet — parts of these majestic 
odes could be popularized with music. They 
might be arranged in the cantata form. 'T is a 
pity that people cannot try their voices on those 
most exultant but tear-compelling lines which 
wind up the glorious " Commemoration Ode," — 
" Bow down, dear Land, for thou hast found 
release." In Whittier's poetry, the pickings are 
even scantier. He always looked into his great 
heart and wrote. But he did not see there the 
Union and the Flag. He saw only the slave. A 
man who dedicated his life, as this best of Quakers 
did, to the release of bondsmen from their bonds, 
and of the oppressed from their tyrants, and 
whose fiery zeal in the cause of human liberty, 
temporal and spiritual, made the whole world 



50 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

his country, was not of the kind that dashes off 
Hail Columbias or Star Spangled Banners at 
a sitting. One would hardly look to the intro- 
spective and philosophic Emerson for a National 
Song. But he wrote one that has the true ring, 
" The Fight at Concord Bridge." And it is 
well mated by his " Fourth of July " hymn begin- 
ning, — 

" O tenderly the haughty day 
Fills his blue urn with fire." 

When Percival has contributed his passionate 
stanzas headed " It is great for our Country to 
die," and Sprague his lines " To the Sages who 
spoke, to the Heroes who bled," there is little 
more worth accepting from the elder — or, for 
that matter, from the younger — poets of America. 
And the bulk of it all is adapted rather to reci- 
tation than to song. It will live long, but not in 
the Nation's Hymnal. 

Meanwhile, fortunately, it is not needful to put 
many songs into the hearts and mouths of the 
whole people. If the three or four best, set to 
music for four voices, can be universally dis- 
tributed, so that the whole congregation can rise 
and join in them when called upon, Patriotism 
will have received, on the musical side, its sufifi- 



COUNTING THE COST. 5I 

cient stimulus and safeguard. Then it will be 
possible everywhere, as it is now possible no- 
where, to ask banqueters on the Fourth of July, to 
sing not merely one, but two, yea three, stanzas 
of " The Star Spangled Banner " to the orchestral 
accompaniment, and secure a hearty response. 
Then, on Atlantic steamships when the " Fourth '* 
comes round, the performance of " Hail Colum- 
bia " will not be confined to a few daring volun- 
teers, forming their little protective semicircle 
round a timid pianist whom they try to follow 
with the words of one stanza in his blind feeling 
after the tune, but every verse will be roared out 
confidently and truly by the throng of Americans 
in the first cabin. Uncle Sam may have no mer- 
chant fleet to boast of on the ocean at present, 
but he can at least make the ship routes vocal 
with his hymns once a year! 

" AND, PRAY, WHAT WOULD IT ALL COST ? " 

" Not a bad idea," the Rigid Economist is good 
enough to say. Then, producing his inevitable 
pencil and paper, he asks, " What will it cost ? " 
Little good would be done in this world if the 
cost were always counted in advance. It is like 



52 



UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 



ice chilling the warm blood of generous hearts. 
Were cost in money, in comfort, in life, penu- 
riously calculated, there would be scant prog- 
ress, social, moral, or religious. The man who 
always weighs ideas against sordid dollars rarely 
parts with the dollars. But the Rigid Economist 
must be reckoned with politely on this occasion, 
as on all others where appropriations are required 
from Congress. For Congress is the theatre 
where he can always play his part to a gallery 
of the penny-wise and pound-foolish, and be sure 
of their applause. 

In estimating the expense of carrying out such 
a scheme, everything turns on the questions of 
how and what, and whether the work shall be 
done quickly or gradually. Let it be regarded 
as an experiment, and tried slowly by moderate 
annual appropriations if that seems best. If it 
does not stand the trial and vindicate its utility 
in public opinion, no harm will have been done, 
beyond the wasting of a little money by way of 
the spigot, — and that will hardly be missed while 
a steady stream is incessantly pouring from the 
bunghole. 

It is always well to be able to show how one 
good thing may be paid for by money saved from 



PUBLIC DOCUMENT FOOLISHNESS. 53 

doing a bad thing. According to the testimony 
of friends and foes alike, the present Public Doc- 
ument system at Washington is decidedly a bad 
thing, and the only dispute is as to the precise 
degree of its badness. In making a conference 
report on the bill to regulate the printing and 
distribution of public documents, Mr. Richardson 
of Tennessee said the proposed reduction would 
save from ^500,000 to ^750,000 annually. He 
remarked that hundreds of thousands of volumes 
already printed are now rotting in the vaults. 
Mr. Holman antagonized the report, because it 
did not go far enough. He declared that the 
compromise bill would still provide for the print- 
ing of books ninety per cent of which are un- 
worthy a place in any gentleman's library, — 
which is the neat way of saying that they are 
trash. 

Now, the volumes that are not left to rot in 
the vaults are saved from that fate for presenta- 
tion to the favored few. They are, for the most 
part, bulky, hideous to the eye, repellent with 
figures, and of official dryness. No wonder that 
they find their w^a}^ at last to paper mills instead 
of dozily encumbering shelves. But the tracts 
that Uncle Sam's Church would scatter by the 



54 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

million, free, would reach the million. In their 
individual length they would stop far short of 
boredom. The closely packed contents of their 
few pages, replete with interest and instruction, 
would insure their being read, preserved, and 
prized. 

Assuming then, that a sum equivalent, say, to 
part only of what ought to be saved from the 
Public Document foolishness, were available for 
the purpose, let us see how far it could be made 
to go. And, first, consider the item of the tracts, 
which call for a far greater outlay than the 
placards. 

The estimated population of the United States 
in 1895 is 69,000,000. It is ardently to be 
hoped that somehow, and in the course of time, 
every man, woman, and child in the Union may 
be made to understand and appreciate the origin 
and unique excellence of our institutions, and to 
love and cherish the memory of the founders 
and preservers of the Republic. But, for the 
present and for the immediate future, it suffices 
to provide a small instalment of the much needed 
enlightenment to voters only. These, as it ap- 
pears from the returns of the last Presidential 
election, numbered 12,034,858 in 1892. As the 



PATRIOTISM WILL FIND THE WAY. 55 

adult male citizens including the heads of fami- 
lies having spheres of influence in all the house- 
holds of the land, they are the men who should 
first be reached in any well-considered effort to 
educate and confirm the people in Patriotism. 
The voting roll of the United States is rapidly 
lengthening from year to year ; and the records 
of 1892 are insufficient for 1896. But, as it is 
necessary to fix upon some number in a provis- 
ional estimate, no better datum offers than that 
of the known voting population. " But great 
numbers of the voters cannot read," says some 
born objector. But they can have their tracts 
read to them. Every voter, however illiterate, 
feels pride in the possession of a vote. Arouse 
his patriotism and his curiosity by presenting 
him with serial issues of Uncle Sam's Bible, and 
his human nature may be trusted to make some 
acquaintance with them through the kindness of 
his lettered neighbors and friends. Patriotism, 
like Love, will find the way. 

Take, then, in round numbers, for convenience, 
12,000,000 as the figures to go upon, and I am 
not afraid to face the Rigid Economist. The 
printed text of the tracts should be 4 in. by 6 in,, 
which experience proves to be the size most 



56 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

suitable. Tracts of four pages each, — and these 
would be large enough for some of the proposed 
publications, — well printed on fairly good paper, 
would cost at the Government Printing House, on 
a conservative calculation, not more than $2.50 
a thousand. Private establishments would be 
glad to make contracts for the supply at that rate. 
The cost of a million would be only $2,500, and of 
twelve million $30,000. The extremely low price 
of paper and the marvellous perfection and rapid 
working of the modern printing press alone ren- 
der such cheapness possible. Let me pursue the 
problem without the least fear of being devoured 
by a Frankenstein of figures. Arithmetic is 
implacable, but it has no revenges to wreak in 
this case. Among the four-page variety could 
be comprised such matters as Abstracts of Cen- 
sus Reports, and National Hymns (two to a tract, 
words and music). Washington's Farewell Ad- 
dress would take eight pages, costing $60,000 for 
twelve million. To do anything approaching jus- 
tice to the life and character of Washington, or 
Adams, or Jefferson, or Madison, or Monroe, 
would require, say, twelve pages. The same is 
true of any intelligible abridged account of the 
war of the Revolution, or of 1812, or with Mexico. 



DON'T GRUDGE THE MONEY! 57 

Tracts of this magnitude would each cost ^90,000 
for twelve million. Serviceable maps, 2 ft. by 3 ft., 
large enough to show off every part of the 
United States to advantage, would come much 
higher. Made of good paper, well fitted for the 
wear and tear of usage, they could not be pro- 
duced at less than $15 a thousand, and that 
means ^180,000 for the twelve million. But 
that large sum should not be grudged if it 
conduces to the incitement and perpetuity of 
Patriotism. 

Contrasted with these somewhat imposing es- 
timates, the cost of large handsome placards of 
the two varieties, one bearing the Declaration 
of Independence and the other the Constitu- 
tion of the United States, — together proclaiming 
Uncle Sam's unmutilated Creed to all beholders, 
— attached to the walls of 69,000 Post Offices, 
would be insignificant. A size of 2 ft. by 3 ft. for 
each of these documents would probably be large 
enough. Printed in black on good paper, with 
strong cloth backs, mounted with wood top and 
bottom, they would hang straight and not be 
bad lookinsf. Private contractors would cheer- 
fully take the job of furnishing them at ^60 per 
thousand. For less than $10,000, every Post 



58 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

Office in the Union could be supplied with them. 
The maps previously described could also be pro- 
duced in the same style at the same rate, and it 
would be a good idea to hang them also in the 
Post Offices, besides supplying them on the great 
scale already mentioned for the home and per- 
sonal use of every voter. This would bring up 
the entire sum needed for the patriotic equip- 
ment of the Post Offices to a point not exceeding 
$15,000; and if it should cost three, four, or five 
times as much to provide larger, handsomer, 
more durable forms of the same things. Uncle 
Sam could still afford them. 

Having emerged, unscathed I trust, from this 
little arithmetical jungle, let me pause a moment 
for a calm retrospect. A good many subjects 
have been already suggested as supremely impor- 
tant for treatment in various ways. Other sub- 
jects will occur to other men. The field to be 
covered is practically boundless. All that could 
be reasonably asked is to make a beginning. 

With every deference to the views of others, I 
beg to set down the following (recapitulatory in 
part) as offering the most attractive examples of 
what might be prudently undertaken within a 
single year. The estimates, be it borne in mind. 



FOOTING THE FIGURES. 59 

are always for twelve million of voters, excepting 
the placards and maps for Post OflQces : — 

Sketch of Washington's Life ^90,000 

Washington's Farewell Address 60,000 

Outline of the Revolutionary War 90,000 

Songs ("America " and " Star Spangled Banner ") 30,000 

Abstract of Census (No. I.) 30,000 

Official Maps of the United States .... 180,000 

Placards and Maps for Post Offices .... 15,000 

Total ^495,000 

The items of salaries for new men necessary 
to perform the work, and of other contingent 
expenses, cannot here be estimated. All would 
depend on the amount of the output. If the 
scheme I have roughly delineated were actually 
executed within a single year, at an expense for 
extra clerical labor, etc., as high as $100,000, the 
total cost would still be only $595,000.^ But the 
highest Congressional authority assures the peo- 
ple, that between #500,000 and $750,000 could 
annually be saved to the treasury by curtailing 
the Public Document extravagance. The mean 
of these ofHcial figures is $625,000, or $30,000 
more than my plan calls for. Q. e. d. 

It takes a clock about twelve days of twenty- 
four hours each to tick off one million. To print, 

1 If the Declaration (8 pages) and the Constitution (12 pages) were 
added as tracts, the total cost would be ^745,000. 



6o UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

handle, and distribute over the enormous area of 
the Union seventy-two milHons of separate par- 
cels in one year, may seem to many persons a 
task of almost insuperable difficulty. They are 
not aware of the giddy height of figures into 
which Uncle Sam's habitual operations mount, 
and move there with perfect ease. The sale of 
postage stamps of all kinds attains an average 
of twelve millions a day ! This gives some idea 
of the number of letters and papers daily started 
to their destinations. The tremendous move- 
ment is so quiet that, save for the occasional 
appearance of a mail cart on the street, one 
would not suspect its existence. The pension 
list of 1894 called for a disbursement of about 
$140,000,000 among one million persons. Last 
year the Internal Revenue collections amounted 
to $147,000,000 (coming in very handily to meet 
the pensions). All of Uncle Sam's business 
relates to millions ; but, with his thorough or- 
ganization of affairs, they give him no more 
trouble than so many hundreds or tens. Once 
well organized, a railway line from New York 
to San Francisco is no harder to manage than 
a horse-car route in a country town. The amount 
of work that my scheme contemplates would be 



"WAYS." 6 1 

done with so little fuss, along tracks of the pub- 
lic service so well oiled, that there would be no 
outward and visible sign of anything unusual 
going on. 

If two out of every three tracts failed to hit 
the mark, and the third made any man a better 
patriot, the enterprise would pay well. The lar- 
ger proportion of all the tracts ever issued for any 
purpose have miscarried, and still this method 
has continued the admitted best (next always to 
the newspapers) for reaching and influencing 
men in their homes. Let it be tried in the right 
spirit for the upbuilding of Patriotism in the 
United States and trust the People for the 
result ! 

" WAYS." 

The question of " Means " being now, It may 
be assumed, satisfactorily disposed of, that of 
" Ways " comes up on the motion of the Scrupu- 
lous Stickler. This person and the Rigid Econ- 
omist are Siamese twins, inseparably coupled in 
their chronic objection to every new idea. If the 
Scrupulous Stickler and his brother had had 
their way in 1861, the Southern Confederacy 
would have become an accomplished fact, and 



62 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

this mighty Republic the most mournful failure, 
instead of remaining the brightest illustration of 
Popular Government in all history. His stock in 
trade is, for the most part, Precedents. Though 
he invariably opposes the making of Precedents, 
his attachment to them is quite slavish when 
they stand in a good long line behind him. 
Now, Uncle Sam's Church is in luck for prece- 
dents. There are — to mention only the lead- 
ing ones — the Department of Agriculture, the 
Bureau of Education, the Department of Labor, 
the Board of Health, and the Weather Bureau. 
Congress found no explicit power in the Con- 
stitution to provide for any of these good things. 
The authority for their creation is conferred only 
in that broad and flexible phrase, " general wel- 
fare," the fortunate existence of which has 
smoothed the way of our law-makers out of many 
a dilemma. For when some new thing, which 
is not under the Constitutional ban or reserved 
to the States, requires to be done for the sup- 
posed good of the whole country, the authority 
for doing it lies ready at hand in Article I. 
Section 8. It was this happily conceived term, 
" general welfare," that the illustrious Jay, first 
Chief Justice of the United States, in the case 



GENERAL WELFARE. 63 

of Chisholm v. The State of Georgia, declared 
to be " adniirably suited to express a great and 
beneficial design, and comprising everything that 
is requisite, with the blessing of Divine Provi- 
dence, to make the people by whom it was 
adopted prosperous and happy." To spread and 
deepen Patriotism in the minds and hearts of all 
the people is to cater to the " general welfare " as 
effectually as in any other way hitherto tried. If 
Agriculture, Education, Labor, the Public Health, 
and a knowledge of the weather, are proper sub- 
jects for Uncle Sam's affectionate solicitude, why 
not Patriotism, which is the life-blood of the 
Nation .? 

The only pretence of sanction for the Public 
Document business, on its present large and 
wasteful scale, is to be found under the same 
head. 

This great work calls for but little new machin- 
ery. There need be no Secretary of Patriotism 
with a seat in the Cabinet. Put some more desks 
in the Post Office Department for a new Com- 
missioner or Superintendent, with a special staff 
of clerks, and there you have it. Call this branch 
of the Postal Service the " Bureau for the Culture 
and Diffusion of Patriotism." The responsible 



64 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

head should be a well educated American, thor- 
oughly versed in the patriotic literature of his 
country, experienced in selecting and editing 
matter for the press, and as free as possible 
from sectional and political bias. In this world 
it is hard to find anybody who can do anything 
perfectly well. The best available man for the 
position would fall short of the ideal. But if he 
were in entire sympathy with the undertaking, 
and meant well, his mistakes would be few, and 
far outweighed by the value of his labors as 
a whole. If Congress were unwilling to trust 
the business to any one man, let its collective 
wisdom designate, from year to year, along with 
the appropriation, the specific work to be per- 
formed. Whoever gives the orders and whatever 
the incidental blunders may be, the Americans' 
knowledge and love of their country will be in- 
creased, and the fires of Patriotism will be fed. 

In the 69,000 Post Offices there will be 69,000 
persons whose duty it will be to see that the cen- 
tral orders are executed. They will nail Uncle 
Sam's Creed to the walls of his Church. They 
will distribute the successive parts of his Bible to 
the voters when called for,-^ giving public notice of 
the time of their delivery. And the grand army 

1 Or by carriers. 



RELIGION AND PATRIOTISM. 65 

of colporteurs, acting in every part of the Union 
where the mail-bag goes, will not add a single 
dollar to the yearly budget by reason of their 
services. 

RELIGION AND PATRIOTISM. 

All the other churches in the land, inconceiv- 
ably co-operating to strengthen Patriotism, could 
not do the work like Uncle Sam's Church. For 
there are countless numbers who do not go to 
any house of worship, but who do go to the 
Post Office. It is truly said that good churches 
make good citizens. " The powers that be are 
ordained of God." This text may be beaten out 
into thin sermons to justify and sustain equally well 
the autocratic government of Russia, the imperial 
government of Austria, the monarchical govern- 
ment of England, and the republican government 
of the United States. The support rendered to 
the first two named by their Ecclesiastical Es- 
tablishments is always unquestioning and hearty. 
The Bible, in allegory and imagery, seems at first 
sight to lend itself to the idea of Kingly rule 
on the earth. God is the King of Kings, and 
Heaven is a Kingdom with its throne and crown. 
The Pope of Rome is called God's Vicegerent, 



M 



66 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

which is another word for Viceroy, on Earth. 
His Cardinals are princes of the Church. In 
England the Bishop is " my Lord," his chair in 
the Cathedral is his " throne," and his residence 
is a " Palace." These words must not be taken 
too seriously. But they do incontestably show 
that the clergy are not, of necessity, the best bul- 
wark of the American Republic. " My kingdom 
is not of this world," said Christ. It will not do 
to depend too exclusively on His visible Church 
to preserve the Union of these States. During 
the Rebellion the Southern pulpit, when it did 
not preach and pray rebellion, did little to pre- 
vent the Union being rent in twain. It found 
in its Bible a warrant for Slavery, but no Patriot- 
ism. This is not said to shame or blame Southern 
ministers. They were human, and acted up to 
their lights. But the fact is on record to demon- 
strate that churches may sometimes prove a weak 
reed for reliance in the fiery ordeal of a great 
National crisis. No ! Patriotism, which is to the 
Republic what religion is to the Church, must be 
sought not in the Bible, where it is not specifi- 
cally enjoined by name or in effect as the duty of 
the citizen. It must be sought in the words and 
the deeds of the immortal fathers and founders 



WHAT TRUE RELIGION CAN DO. 67 

and saviors of the Union. As helpers, the 
churches of all sects can do much good if they 
will. All that the Christian religion teaches of 
the duty of man to man is tributary to a healthy 
Patriotism, and hence conservative of the Repub- 
lic. But for the exercise of a powerful, direct, un- 
equivocal, all-pervasive, and continuous Patriotism, 
we must resort to Uncle Sam's Church and its 
special methods. 

True Religion can always make itself felt in 
directing Patriotism to rightful ends. The two 
can combine in enacting just and beneficent laws, 
and electing honest and wise rulers. If Patri- 
otism ever inclines to wars of conquest, or to 
wanton trespasses on the rights of other nations. 
Religion can restrain it. Patriotism furnishes to 
Religion, in this country, a boundless field for 
good. While the one preserves the Union, knit- 
ting all its people together in the bonds of 
brotherhood, the other can all the more easily 
raise the whole Nation to hiQ:her levels of that 
Righteousness which exalteth it. Patriotism can 
prepare the way for Religion as surely as Religion 
can smooth the path for Patriotism. 



68 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 



EDUCATION AND PATRIOTISM. 

Education is not always Patriotism. A man 
may master all the learning of all the Univer- 
sities, and, by the very superfineness of his polish 
and the excess of his attainments, be incapable 
of feeling a patriotic glow. When dear old 
Dr. Johnson declared Patriotism to be " the last 
refuge of scoundrels," he was in one of his 
choleric and cynical moods, if he was not entirely 
misreported. The greatly cultured man of to- 
day might not go as far as the testy Doctor. But 
he might incline to regard Patriotism as a vul- 
gar mood unmeriting his lofty patronage. The 
leaders of the Rebellion were the most highly 
educated men of the South. And, long before 
their day, came two of the same select class, but 
far more eminent in learning and eloquence, — 
Calhoun and Hayne, — with their advocacy of 
State Rights and of Nullification, and their men- 
aces of Secession at a time when nobody was 
threatening slavery. Had the Southern mind 
been directed and kept in patriotic channels by 
its trusted guides from the start. Patriotism would 
have found a peaceful solution of the slavery 



THE TREASON OF INDIFFERENTISM. 69 

problem in the course of time. But that, alas ! is 
among the might-have-beens. 

There is a silent, sullen treason to the Repub- 
lic, which is indifferentism. That may and often 
does co-exist with the higher education. It may 
disappear in presence of imminent peril, and the 
most indifferent of men may become a real 
patriot ready to die for his country, reminding 
one of the sort of friend who never lets one sus- 
pect his friendship except in the extremest hour 
of misfortune and calamity. As the friends for 
every-day wear are the most prized, so the man 
who carries his patriotism on his sleeve into his 
daily life of society and business, and employs 
it in discovering and preventing dangers, — in- 
stead of supinely waiting for them to turn up 
and then fighting them, — is the most desirable 
of patriots. The education which makes good 
citizens by instructing them in their duties and 
responsibilities is the best breeder of Patriotism. 
The public schools, where the history of the 
country is taught and the Constitution is among 
the text-books, and national songs are sung, are 
the very nurseries of Patriots. The Patriotism 
there set forth is not overlaid by the veneering 
too often given by the higher education. If Pub- 



70 



UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 



lie Schools make Patriots, it is no less true that 
Patriots make Public Schools. It is better to 
begin with the Public Schools; but, failing in 
that, let us begin with the Patriots, and wait for 
the time and money required to educate the citi- 
zen in the more gradual and thorough way. 
Until the day of Universal Popular Education 
arrives in this country, Uncle Sam's Church may 
be safely trusted with the high responsibility of 
the Patriotic cult, which can be taught at once 
and everywhere. People ignorant and indocile 
in everything else may prove teachable pupils 
in Patriotism. 

A GRAND MONOPOLY FOR PATRIOTISM ! 

If any one religious denomination could have 
the exclusive use of 69,000 Post Offices to spread 
its creed on the walls and pass out its tracts to 
all comers, how greatly it would prize the privi- 
lege ! All its missionaries and other proselyting 
machinery sink into nothingness compared with 
this. If a political party could monopolize the 
same facilities for posting its platform and circu- 
lating the lives and speeches of its candidates, it 
would have an initial advantage of the greatest 



A GRAND MONOPOLY FOR PATRIOTISM! 71 

value for campaign purposes. If any private 
business could enjoy the same opportunity to 
advertise itself, a colossal fortune would be its 
sure and quick reward. But Uncle Sam is pro- 
hibited from lending his name to any form of 
religion. The jealous rivalry of parties is a bar 
to the ambition of any one of them to utilize the 
Post Offices and the Postmasters for its sole be- 
hoof. There is no fear that any man, or com- 
pany, or trust, however rich and powerful, will 
ever be allowed to acquire the exclusive right to 
tap the pockets of the people in this most com- 
prehensive and searching way. The immense 
field is free for Uncle Sam to occupy by himself 
and for himself alone. If he does it in the right 
way for the healthy stimulation of Patriotism, the 
resulting blessings will be inestimably precious 
for generations to come. 

There cannot be too much Patriotism. There 
is a joy in Patriotism, as there is a joy in Religion 
and in human love. It ennobles the life of the 
poorest and the richest, the most ignorant and 
the most learned. It is the parent virtue of 
courage, decision, fortitude, and patience. It is 
the real defence of Liberty and the Republic, of 
which great armies and fleets are but the instru- 



72 UNCLE SAM'S CHURCH. 

ments. It is as necessary for our security against 
all internal dissensions as against all foreign rivals 
and enemies. The pride of citizenship which it 
engenders makes itself felt at every point along 
the whole line of a freeman's duty. It inspires 
him, as nothing else can, to nominate and vote 
for the best men for public offices, from Alder- 
man to President. It prepares him to address 
his mind earnestly and intelligently to each public 
question as it arises, from the building of a school- 
house to the peaceful acquisition of Canada, or 
Mexico, or Cuba, or the Hawaiian Islands. 

Socialism threatens, zvhen it has gathered strength 
enough, to put the principles of I^ree Government to 
a very severe test. It may need all the Patriotism 
that we can muster to m^eet that grave issue ! 

The life of a Nation is measured by its Patri- 
otism. When its Patriotism dies, the Nation is 
dead. This is an eternal, immutable law. With 
its Patriotism in full vigor, the ^growth of a 
Nation and its power and influence throughout 
the world are correspondingly vigorous. No 
matter whither Patriotism may lead us. We 
must follow its indications in the spirit of the 
Fathers, and leave the rest to God. Let us do 
our whole duty as good citizens, and trust to 



A NEW RALLYING CALL. 



73 



Him for a continuance of blessings upon the 
Union of these States. 

Room, then, among the rallying calls of the 
New Patriotism, for " Uncle Sam's Church, his 
Creed, Bible, and Hymn-Book." 




H 33 



89 






LIBRARY OF 




CONGRESS 




011 527 448 A 



